


The Gift of the Storm

by Ghost_Rider_of_the_Aragon



Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies), Ondine (2009)
Genre: Angst, Gen, How could I do this?, Maaaaaajor angst, SO SORRY, not sorry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-17
Updated: 2017-05-17
Packaged: 2018-11-01 16:42:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 599
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10925865
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ghost_Rider_of_the_Aragon/pseuds/Ghost_Rider_of_the_Aragon
Summary: In the aftermath of a storm, they deal with loss. Two years later, in the aftermath of another, have they found hope again?





	The Gift of the Storm

**Author's Note:**

  * For [acciogramander](https://archiveofourown.org/users/acciogramander/gifts).



> This is written as a preface to an RP thread on tumblr between myself and @ofthelune. One day, I will try to write a piece that doesn't end in suffering, and is actually funny, and is happy. But it is not this day. This day I bring you angst.

_Once upon a time…_  
Why is it always once upon a time?  
Because that’s...how stories start.  
And a very good time it was.  
Yes, it was a good time...And it was a bad time. 

 

A bad time indeed. What had started as a normal fishing day had quickly deteriorated into chaos and turbulence. And waves. Great waves. Taller than the boat, tossing it like a toy in some child’s bath.  
“Stay here, hold the tiller steady!” Syracuse shouts to his wife, his Ondine, barely audible over the wind and the snapping lines. He rushes towards the door, on his way to secure the nets and the hatch leading down to the hold.  
“Syracuse! Wait!” she gasps, following him out. The boat pitches wildly as it nearly disappears between swells of waves. Before he can reply, the sea crashes across the deck, and before Syracuse can find something to hold onto, he finds himself hanging off the side of the boat by his ankle, tangled in rope.  
Lightning and thunder and water surround him, a terrified cry tears loose from his throat. This is how it ends, this is it, no goodbye to Ondine, no goodbye to Annie. A second wave crashes into the boat, pummeling him into the side of the vessel, nearly crushing him. Then he feels a hand grasp his raincoat and haul him back aboard.  
Ondine.  
Joanna.  
His wife from the sea.  
His salvation.  
He clings to her, gasping for air, knowing that this was probably it. She collapses against his chest, grateful for one last chance to hold him. She kisses his forehead and starts to say something, but another wave crashes into them. Syracuse is knocked out against the railing and, mercifully, doesn’t see Ondine washed away.

 

***

 

When he awakens, he’s in a hospital bed, his now thirteen-year-old daughter sitting beside him, and her eyes are red.  
“Annie? Wh-”  
“Oh, Da…” she whispers, nearly choking on a sob.  
“Where is she?”  
“She went back.” Syracuse feels his heart stop, like half of it was gone.  
“Back…?” He feels like a two-year-old, unable to grasp the implication  
“To the sea, Da, they still haven’t found her.”  
“No. No...don’t say that. Don’t say that…” he whispers, shaking his head feebly. “You’re lying, lying…”  
“I’m sorry…I’m sorry...” Annie presses the button to all for the nurse so they could sedate him before he hurt himself.  
“No, don’t...don’t...I have to find her.” And everything fades to black again.

 

***

 

Three months later, and they still haven’t found any trace of Joanna. Syracuse goes out on his boat, every morning before dawn, and his search usually ends well after dark, at the bottom of a whiskey bottle. Annie continues with her homework, very few friends, and praying every night that her father will come back to her. The stranger in the armchair is not Syracuse the fisherman, he’s a shadow twisted by grief and alcohol. She’s tempted to take the bottles away every time a new one shows up, but that would be taking away what little bit of a crutch he had left.

 

She’s not allowed near the sea anymore.  
No more Sunday afternoons out in the bay, no going down to Roan Carrig to see the seals. They reminded him too much of the way Ondine had come to them.  
No more collecting shells at dusk. 

 

That is, until a stranger with a sky blue tail shows up on their beach two years later, after a storm much like the one that had taken their Ondine.

 

Maybe fairytales could be real again.


End file.
